The prior art is replete with scores of patents which describe various conveyor systems which are utilized to convey a product along a course of travel for various purposes.
In the processing of various food products, such as potato chips, french fries, and other lightly seasoned and or coated snack foods or frangible products, food processors have employed vibratory conveyors such as exemplified in U.S. Pat. No. 4,313,535 to move the products from one location to another. Vibratory conveyors of this general design have found wide acceptance in the food industry because conveyors of this nature carefully handle food products and minimize the damage to same while the food products are being conveyed from one work station to another.
Still further, conveyors of the nature described above have further been employed with other assemblies such as automated diverters as seen in U.S. Pat. No. 6,460,680 and which will divert a food product stream into a secondary course of travel for other processing or packaging. The teachings of U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,313,535 and 6,460,680 are incorporated by reference herein.
Gate assemblies of various designs have been employed with various conveyors for purposes of diverting streams of products along various courses of travel as discussed above. One example of a prior art gate is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 6,505,727. This patent shows a gate which selectively occludes an aperture formed in the conveyor bed. In this arrangement, the gate may be moved to a non-occluding position to allow a stream of product, acting under the influence of gravity, to fall or move therethrough so as to be directed away into another course of travel. Typically in these arrangements, another conveyor or a work station is disposed below the aperture and is operable to take the diverted product to a new processing area or to the work station. Yet further, gates have been designed for use with vibratory conveyors as seen in U.S. published application 2002/0088694 A1.
In modern food processing operations, multiple and quite different food products may be processed either simultaneously or sequentially. Consequently, food processors are concerned regarding possible contamination which might result when the fragmentary remains of a first food product finds their way into a second food product. This contamination may occur in a number of different ways. For example, if a food processor is employing a vibratory conveyor to move a frangible product such as potato chips, the operation of the conveyor as it moves the product along the conveyor may tend to produce crumbs or small fragments of the same product. In conveyors of conventional design which utilize gate assemblies of the prior art, these small fragments or crumbs may become deposited or lodged in small spaces or cracks between the conveyor and the gate. While a thorough cleaning of such areas will typically remove most food debris, some food material is either overlooked or escapes this process and is subsequently released into a later and different stream of food product when the gate is employed with that food product.
Yet further, another source of contamination from existing food debris occurs when small food fragments are released during the movement of the product along the conveyor and are able to travel or work their way through the space which normally exists between the gate and the conveyor. This food debris then contaminates the food stream moving below, and adjacent to that same conveyor.
In addition to the foregoing, and on occasion, mechanical gate assemblies fail. While typically many failures are unrelated to the food product being processed, on occasion, debris from a food product may impair the mechanical or electrical operation of a gate, such that it fails to operate properly. On these occasions, the conveyor must be disabled, and repairmen called to repair the gate so the conveyor may be placed back into operation. This of course is costly both in the sense of manpower and also in lost production time.
The present invention as described hereinafter addresses and overcomes many of the perceived shortcomings attendant with the prior art devices and practices utilized heretofore.